You need someone with a high level of education in Chemical Engineering, Business Management and Leadership

You need someone who can speak - Hindi, Gujarati, English or German

In just over a month, Talmix consultant Yogesh will be celebrating his first anniversary since taking the plunge into independent consulting. But this Transformations Expert and Chemical Engineer is anything but a newbie to the consulting world. We caught up with Yogesh amidst his busy schedule to explore his experience so far.

For Yogesh, the decision to leave a high-profile career path and adopt a more independent one was one that simply felt right. “I think the key was, I have had more than 14 years of extremely diverse professional experience in strategy, operational, commercial and technical functions, which gave me a good foundation and confidence to explore opportunities through independent routes. Although I’m a chemical engineer by degree, I have had significant opportunities to work in various business critical functions, and grown to become an operational excellence, asset management and strategic transformation expert”. Yogesh obtained his PhD in Chemical Engineering from Loughborough University and since then, has been active in Oil & Gas, Energy and Utility industry sectors in multiple geographies globally. But his choice to follow a consultancy career was not based on his chemical engineering background, but rather on the skills and expertise he’d built up across several strategic business functions.

From Zero to Hero – all 15 million pounds of it.

“It’s always been important for me to challenge myself by looking for better, more efficient, ways to do things. I like the element of thinking outside of my boundaries. I’m constantly questioning, learning, challenging myself to do things better, easier, faster,” he tells me. And through the adoption of this personal philosophy, it is Yogesh’s clients who benefit from the same way of working.

Yogesh’s introduction to the consulting approach into regulated industry customers came after an opportunity he pitched to Aggreko, his employer at the time, where he led his team of process consultants in The Netherlands, and helped the business to successfully deliver the business plan, financial revenues of £15M and strong financial growth of 106% CAGR between 2008 and 2012. “As we constantly kept developing new solutions, so we added new industrial segments, but also territories, and it was during this time when I discovered the power that consulting services hold for organisations”. It was not too long after returning to the UK and a drive to find a reasonable work-life balance that Yogesh felt ready to make his independent move.

New opportunities for a Global Industrial Engineering giant

Since starting his own independent consulting business under the Siimac Consultancy Ltd banner, Yogesh has partnered with other experienced associates within his network to offer his clients a range of solutions that help them address critical opportunities and challenges associated with entering new markets, achieving best-in-class operational performance and making direct and positive impact on their bottom lines across most industries.

And one such opportunity, through the Talmix platform no less, included a consulting project for an industrial engineering stalwart – a market-leading climate solutions provider employing more than 3000 people globally. “My client was looking to diversify their revenue portfolio and explore new opportunities for growth for the business. Working very closely with their executive teams, we were able to highlight areas of risk and opportunity and together with the client, made the decision to pursue an option that would deliver substantial growth for the organisation”.

The make-or-break of your organisation’s decision

Yogesh understands the incredible influence that a consultant carries. “You, as a consultant, are basically asking your client to invest a considerable amount of money, resource and time, into a particular idea. The decision for your client to invest upstream or downstream is down to the strategic advice and research that you offer. Not only is it a financial investment at the time, but forms the foundation of the business’s long-term plan going forward. That decision, of which you play a huge role as a consultant, could determine whether that organisation makes it, or not”, he tells me. Yogesh is proud of the way he works. He is not a “typical consultant” as he puts it. He enjoys being the solution architect to a problem. He is proud of the way he develops new ways of looking at things, and solving problems, but he is even prouder of his ability to implement the solutions into his clients’ operations. “For me, designing a solution is only 20% of the effort, the bigger and significant challenges come when I am implementing those strategic and operational transformational programs to achieve the results that I’m after,” he adds.

And when one looks at the legacy of successful projects Yogesh has delivered throughout his career, there is no doubting that.

About the Author

Katy is an independent marketing consultant and founded Fresh Brew Marketing out of her love for the cuppa. A seasoned marketer, Katy writes for several global publications and provides outsourced marketing services to businesses throughout the UK. She is a keen geocacher and rates running around in city centres dressed in Christmas lights as one of her most successful Social Media campaigns to date.